LaBrava (11 page)

LaBrava got ready during Joe Stella’s speech. When the man finished, sitting immovable, a block of stone, LaBrava said, “The other thing we have in common, besides both of us being from the Windy City, we’d like to keep the Director of Internal Revenue happy. Wouldn’t you say that’s true?”

Joe Stella said, “Oh, shit,” and did sound tired.

“You’re familiar with form SS-8, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know, there so many forms”—getting tireder by the moment—“What’s SS-8?”

LaBrava felt himself taking on an almost-forgotten role—Revenue officer, Collection Division—coming back to him like hopping on a bike. The bland expression, the tone of condescending authority: I’m being nice, but watch it.

“You file payroll deductions, withholding, F.I.C.A.?”

“Yeah, a course I do.”

“You never hire guards as independent contractors? Even on a part-time basis?”

“Well, that depends what you mean . . .”

“You’re not aware that an SS-8 has ever been filed by a former employee or independent contractor? It’s never been called to your attention to submit a reply?”

“Wait a minute—Jesus, you know all the forms you gotta keep track of? My bookkeeper comes in once a week, payday, she’s suppose to know all that. Man, I’m telling you—try and run a business today, a bonded service. First, where’m I gonna get anybody’s any good’d work for four bucks an hour to begin with? . . . Hey, you feel like a drink?”

“No thanks.”

“You know who I get?”

“The cowboys.”

“I get the cowboys, I get the dropouts, I get these guys dying to pack, walk around the shopping mall in their uniform, this big fucking .38 on their hip. Only, state regulation, they’re suppose to pin their license—like a driver’s license in a plastic cover—on their shirt. But they do that they look like what they are, right? Mickey Mouse store cops. So they don’t wear ’em and the guy from the state license division sees ’em and I get fined a hunnert bucks each and put on probation ninety days. I also, to stay in business, I gotta post bond, five grand, and I gotta have three-hundred-grand liability insurance, a hunnert grand property damage. The insurance lapses a week cause the fucking insurance guy’s out at Hialeah every day and it’s my fault, I’m suspended till I show cause why I oughta not get fucked over by the state of Florida where I’m helping with the employment situation. I’m not talking about the federal government you understand. You guys, IRS, you got a job to do—keep that money coming in to run the government, send guns to all the different places they need guns, defend our ass against . . . you know what I’m talking about. Fucking Castro’s only a hunnert miles away. Nicaragua, how far’s that? It isn’t too far, I know.”

“Richard Nobles,” LaBrava said, “he ever been arrested before?”

Joe Stella paused. “Before what? Jesus Christ, is that who we’re talking about? Richie Nobles? Jesus, you can have him.”

“You know where I can find him?”

“I think he quit. I haven’t seen him in three days. Left the car, no keys, the dumb son of a bitch. All those big good-looking assholes, I think they get hair instead of brains. What’s the matter, Richie hasn’t paid his taxes? I believe it.”

“What I’m curious about—guy applies for a job, you ask him if he’s ever been arrested, don’t you?”

“I did I’d be in violation of your federal law, invasion of privacy. I can’t ask if the guy was ever a mental patient either. I can ask him, have you ever been convicted of a felony, or have you ever committed one and didn’t get caught? But I can’t ask him if he’s ever been arrested.”

“You did issue him a handgun.”

“They buy their own.”

“So he’s got a license.”

“You apply, you want to be an armed guard, you gotta get clearance through the FBI and the State Department of Law Enforcement. The guy—it takes months—he gets his license or he gets a certified letter in the mail saying he’s turned down. But they don’t notify me, ever.”

“Have you seen his license?”

“Yeah, he showed it to me.”

“Then he must be clean, uh? They checked him out.”

Joe Stella said, “You ready for a drink now?”

LaBrava nodded. “Sounds good.”

He watched Joe Stella push up from his desk. The man moved with an effort to get a bottle of Wild Turkey and glasses from a file cabinet, ice and a can of Fresca from a refrigerator LaBrava had thought was a safe. Pouring double bourbons with a splash of Fresca Joe Stella said, “First one today. What time is it? Almost ten-thirty, that’s not bad. Long as you had breakfast.” He handed a drink to LaBrava and sat down with the bottle close to him on the desk.

LaBrava took a good sip.

“Nice drink, huh?”

“Not bad.”

“Refreshing with a little bite to it.” Joe Stella took down half his drink. Poured another ounce or so of bourbon into it, and added a little more. He said, “Ahhh, man . . .”

“I bet he’s been arrested,” LaBrava said, “but never convicted, uh?”

Joe Stella said, “Richie’s from upstate. Some of the boys here call him Big Scrub when he’s in a good mood, call him Big Dick he’ll grin at you. Otherwise nobody talks to him. You understand the type I mean?”

“I know him,” LaBrava said.

“He was arrested up there, you’re right, for destruction of government property. The son of a bitch shot an eagle.”

“I understand he ate it,” LaBrava said.

“I wouldn’t be surprised. Richie’ll eat anything. He’ll drink al
most
anything. He came to work here he gave me a half gallon of shine with peaches in it, whole big peaches . . . That’s a good drink, isn’t it?”

“Nice.”

“He shot the eagle he was living up around Ocala, the Big Scrub country. Richie was a canoe guide, he’d take birdwatchers and schoolteachers back in the swamp, show ’em nature and come out somewhere up on the St. Johns River. He wasn’t doing that he’d run supplies for a couple of moonshiners, few hundred pounds a sugar a trip. These two brothers he knew had a still in there. So when he got busted for the eagle he traded off, gave the feds the two brothers and they got two to five in Chillicothe. I asked him, didn’t it bother him any to turn in his friends? He says, ‘No, it weren’t no hill to climb.’ “ Joe Stella drank and topped it off again, the color of his drink turning clear amber in the window sunlight. “No, it weren’t no hill to climb. He’s around here more’n ten minutes I start to sound like a fucking cracker.” Joe Stella took another drink and sat back. “You ever hear of Steinhatchee?”

“Sounds familiar.”

“Way up on the Gulf side, where the Steinhatchee River comes out. Sleepy little place, the people there, they cut timber for Georgia-Pacific or fish mullet outta the river, use these skiffs they call bird-dog boats, make ten thousand a year, top. Till they saw their first bale of marijuana and found out they could make ten thousand a
night
—buy it offa shrimp boats’d come in there and wholesale it. These hardshell Baptists, all of a sudden they’re getting rich in the dope business. They never smoked it, you understand, they just ran it. Well, Richie Nobles had a relative living over there and found out about it. So what do you think Richie does?”

“If he got rich,” LaBrava said, “I know he didn’t declare it.”

“No, Richie believes marijuana is for sissies. But it bothers him these people that don’t know shit’re making all that money. So he tells the DEA and they send him in, see if he can join the business.”

“Professional snitch,” LaBrava said.

“Kind you people love, huh?” Joe Stella said. “Once he was in tight there, part of the deal, the feds wired him. Richie comes back with enough to bust all his new friends. Testified against ’em in Jacksonville federal court, change of venue to protect his ass, and put enough on his own rela-tive, some cracker name Buster something, to send him up to Ohio for thirty-five years. Second flop’s the long one, the first time the guy only drew three.”

“What’s Richard get out of it?”

“Enemies. He knows anything he knows how to piss people off.” Joe Stella hesitated, about to drink. He stared over the rim of his glass. “None of that’s familiar?”

“Why would it be?”

“You don’t know an old guy name Miney, huh? Miney”—looking over his desk, picking up a scrap of notepaper—“Combs. Father of Buster Combs, the one was sent up.”

“Don’t know ’em,” LaBrava said.

“See, you’re not the first one come looking for Richie. He’s a popular boy.”

“I can see why.”

“This old guy was in here, talk just like Richie. He’s the one told me about Steinhatchee. I asked Richie—it was only like a week ago—if it was true. He says, ‘Yeah, I done more’n one favor for my Uncle Sam.’ “

LaBrava said, “So he left the Big Scrub, came down here to work . . .”

“Came down to Dade with a federal recommendation, wanting to join the police. Miami and Dade-Metro he says wouldn’t even talk to him. He was a gypsy cop for a while, worked for Opa-locka, Sweetwater, Hialeah Gardens, got fired for taking bribes, one thing or another, and came to work for me.”

“Where’s he live?”

“Same thing the old guy asked. I don’t know. I never was able to reach him on a number he gave me. A woman’d answer and say, ‘No, he ain’t here and I hope I never see the son of a bitch again.’ Words to that effect, they’d say it different ways and hang up.”

“Any of the women sound . . . older or educated, like they were well off?”

“I don’t know how
well
off, I know they were
pissed
off.”

“Why’d you keep him on?”

“I thought I explained it, Christ, try and get help aren’t all misfits or retirees, old geezers . . . You want another drink? I think I’ll have one.”

“No, I’m fine.”

Joe Stella pushed up to get himself another ice cube and the can of Fresca, stumbled against the desk as he came back and sat down again. “I think you laid a smoke screen on me. You aren’t with the IRS, are you? . . . Gimme that Windy City shit, I bet you never even been to Chicago.”

“I passed through it once,” LaBrava said, “on my way to Independence, Missouri. It looked like a pretty nice town.”

“Passed through it . . . You know, I was thinking,” Joe Stella said, pouring. “Guy like you—I could fire three of my dumbbells, pay you twelve bucks an hour and give you just the cream, supervisory type work. What would you say to that?”

AGAIN HE EXPERIENCED
the strange sense of time. Having lunch on the front porch of the Cardozo Hotel with a movie star out of his memory. She wore dark glasses, round black ones, and a wide-brimmed Panama straight across her eyes. He watched her.

He watched her take dainty bites of marinated conch, raising the fork in her left hand upside down, her moves unhurried. He watched her break off a piece of French bread, hold it close to her face, elbow resting on the table, wrist bent, staring out of shade at the ocean in sunlight, then slowly bring the piece of bread to her mouth, not looking at it, and he would see her lips part to receive the bread and then close and he would see the movie star’s masseter begin to work, still unhurried. He wasn’t sure where the masseter was located, Franny hadn’t told him that. Franny said the movie star used some kind of secret cream, placenta tissue extract, and very likely said
Q
and
X
with exaggerated emphasis in front of mirrors and wore sunglasses till sundown so she wouldn’t get squint wrinkles. His gaze would shift briefly from Jean Shaw and he would see:

Franny sitting on the wall in the strip of oceanfront park across the street, taking Polaroid shots of the hotels. Franny in cutoffs cut so high they must be choking her.

Della Robbia women in lawn chairs talking about Medicare and Social Security.

Maurice coming along Ocean Drive with a grocery sack, skinny legs, faded yellow shorts that reached almost to his knees.

Cars with tourists passing slowly, sightseeing.

A young Cuban guy talking to Franny now. The guy fooling with his ear, Franny laughing. The guy posing, hand on his hip, seductive, strange, as Franny aimed her Polaroid at him.

And his eyes, behind his own sunglasses, would slide back to the movie star’s face, pale but in full color. The skin was smooth, without a trace of what might appear to be a tuck, a lift. He believed it didn’t matter even if she’d had one. He believed he was in love with her face.

She would turn her head to him and seem to smile, used to being looked at. He wanted to see her eyes but would have to wait.

She said, “You know, that’s a lovely shirt.” Then surprised him, lowered her sunglasses to the slender tip of her nose, letting him see in daylight a line beneath each of her eyes, slightly puffed, a look that he liked, a slight imperfection. She replaced her glasses as she said, “I don’t believe I’ve ever called a man’s shirt lovely before, but it is. I love hibiscus.” She said, “I almost married a man who wore only dark brown shirts and always with a dark brown necktie. Odd? . . . Maybe not. He made three thousand dollars a week as a screen writer, he kept an apartment at the Chateau Marmont and died of malnutrition.” She said, “I want to see more of your work, I think it’s stunning. Will you show me?”

He said, “I want to photograph you.”

“I’ve been photographed.”

“Maybe you have . . .”

Maurice said, “Well well
well
,” on the street side of the stone-slab porch railing, stepping up on the base to look at their table. “What’re you having, conch? You ever see it they take it out of the shell? You wouldn’t eat it. Gimme a bite.” He lowered the grocery sack to the railing and leaned over it, face raised waiting as Jean Shaw speared a piece of conch and offered it.

“Another? You can have the rest, I’m finished.”

“I don’t want to wreck my appetite. We’re eating in tonight, fried steak and onions, railroad-style. Gimme a sip—whatever it is.”

She offered her glass. “Plain old Scotch.”

“How many you had?”

She looked at LaBrava. “How many, six, seven?”

Maurice said, “It’s three o’clock in the afternoon!”

“We’ve had two, Maury. Don’t have a heart attack.” In that quiet, unhurried tone. He left them and she said, “Do you like his shorts? They have to be at least twenty years old. He may be the most eccentric guy I know. And I’ve known a few, I’ll tell you.”